I was in the same situation re: UMich v. UIUC for law school. I chose UMich, but I don't think you should.

A couple things:

- I came to Michigan with 3 years work experience in finance. I did far better at OCI than I expected based on my 1L GPA. I interviewed mostly for transactional practices, and I think my success had a lot to do with the relevance and duration of my experience.

- Based on what I saw at OCI, I sometimes regret coming to Michigan because I think I could have landed a substantially similar job coming out of UIUC. When I say substantially similar, I don't necessarily mean similar Vault ranking - the Michigan name significantly increased my chances of nabbing a spot at my current "prestigious" firm.* However, I'm confident that I could have landed a market-salaried Big Law gig in Chicago doing substantially similar work. People in Big Law want to hire responsible, reliable adults who can produce consistently high-quality work product; raw brilliance is nowhere near as important as you might think. If your 7 years w/e is actually relevant to IP practice, this will be a huge boost come hiring season.

With 7 years of work experience (and a strong LSAT score to boot) I think you have a good shot of being successful at UIUC and, ultimately, in the Chicago job search. You may have to "network" a bit harder since the employment channels offered by Michigan are undoubtedly better, but I personally don't think they're worth an extra $100k in your scenario.

*I'm trying my hardest not to be a dick about this. If you want more details please PM me. It's no secret that lawyers are obsessed with prestige, and I'm discussing my firm in such terms to enhance the credibility of this post.

RE: Daft & Direct's post above seems to point more favorably to Michigan, not UIUC, by my reading. One's first placement out of law school greatly affects future near to mid-term opportunities. Better to go with the odds since a $100,000 difference is a reasonable amount of student loan debt for one seeking biglaw in a major location.

As a UIUC person I would almost always say go to Michigan, but IP at UIUC is a lot easier to do than your average UIUC student. Every person from my class that had a hard science background got biglaw at OCI or the Patent fair. Most even had firm jobs their 1L summers, something almost no one else at UIUC gets. They didn't have to be in the top 1/4 like the rest of the class and also they had a lot more geographical flexibility than the average UIUC student.

With that said, $120k for Michigan isn't bad at all. But I think if OP has a hard science background, will be pretty safe at either place

thebobs1987 wrote:As a UIUC person I would almost always say go to Michigan, but IP at UIUC is a lot easier to do than your average UIUC student. Every person from my class that had a hard science background got biglaw at OCI or the Patent fair. Most even had firm jobs their 1L summers, something almost no one else at UIUC gets. They didn't have to be in the top 1/4 like the rest of the class and also they had a lot more geographical flexibility than the average UIUC student.

With that said, $120k for Michigan isn't bad at all. But I think if OP has a hard science background, will be pretty safe at either place

I come from a chemistry background, not ideal, but i am patent bar eligible.

thebobs1987 wrote:As a UIUC person I would almost always say go to Michigan, but IP at UIUC is a lot easier to do than your average UIUC student. Every person from my class that had a hard science background got biglaw at OCI or the Patent fair. Most even had firm jobs their 1L summers, something almost no one else at UIUC gets. They didn't have to be in the top 1/4 like the rest of the class and also they had a lot more geographical flexibility than the average UIUC student.

With that said, $120k for Michigan isn't bad at all. But I think if OP has a hard science background, will be pretty safe at either place

I come from a chemistry background, not ideal, but i am patent bar eligible.

Usually anything outside of engineering usually requires a MS or higher based on what I've heard, but your work experience could probably overcome that.